The Land Before Time X: The Great Longneck Migration
The Land Before Time X: The Great Longneck Migration (known internationally as The Land Before Time X: The Great Migration) is the tenth film in the Land Before Time series. Voice Actors English Voice Cast *Kiefer Sutherland as Bron *Alec Medlock as Littlefoot *John Ingle as the Narrator/Topsy *Kenneth Mars as Grandpa Longneck *Miriam Flynn as Grandma Longneck *Aria Noelle Curzon as Ducky *Jeff Bennett as Petrie *Rob Paulsen as Spike *Anndi McAfee as Cera *Brandon DePaul as Shorty *James Garner as Pat *Bernadette Peters as Sue *Frank Welker as Belly Dragger/Sharpteeth Japanese voice cast *Minami Takayama: Littlefoot *Rica Matsumoto: Cera *Satomi Kōrogi: Ducky *Yūji Mitsuya: Petrie *Sailor King: Spike *George Nakata: Topsy Note: The Japanese voice actors are appearing so far. Plot Plagued by mysterious dreams, known to the dinosaurs as "Sleep Stories", Littlefoot, his grandparents and all the other Longnecks depart the Great Valley, joining up with other Longneck herds as they travel to a single location; with Cera, Petrie, Spike, and Ducky (Littlefoot's friends) following the herds to an enormous crater, which they believe is the culmination of their journey. Littlefoot learns that long ago, that the Bright Circle (sun) was going to fall. However, a number of Longnecks came together to this very spot and raised up their necks, lifting the Circle back to where it had been. According to this creation myth, this stretching of their necks is how the Longnecks got their long necks. History is about to repeat itself, and so the Longnecks have returned to the crater in order to save the sun once more. However, another surprise is in store, as Littlefoot meets his father, Bron, for the first time in his life. However, Bron isn't alone. Since parting from his now deceased wife (a song from The Land Before Time IV: Journey Through the Mists reveals that the concept of marriage does exist in The Land Before Time universe), he has become guardian to another young Longneck, Shorty, who becomes jealous of Littlefoot since Bron is spending more time with him. One dawn, Shorty tries to run away, but Littlefoot stops him and convinces him to rejoin the migration, he even goes as far as to suggest they become brothers. At this point, Littlefoot's friends arrive. Soon after, following a Sharptooth (Tyrannosaurid) attack! the time comes for the Longnecks to save the sun again. Then they succeed and save the world. (However, the audience watching the film will recognize that what happened was, in fact, a solar eclipse; the Longnecks merely thought the sun was falling.) With their mission completed, the herds depart. Knowing their true places, Littlefoot tells Bron to take care of Shorty, and returns to the Valley with his friends and grandparents. Reception James Plath said on Reel.com that The Great Longneck Migration was among the best of the sequels to The Land Before Time, together with The Land Before Time III: The Time of the Great Giving, The Land Before Time V: The Mysterious Island, and The Land Before Time VIII: The Big Freeze. He believed it was one of the more plot-filled of the installments, and would likely be one that children would want to watch many times over. He also said that, due to the fact that main character Littlefoot finally meets his father in this episode, but in the end decides to stay with his grandparents, whilst his dad stays with his herd, it would be a good film for children and fathers who live similar lives to watch together.James Plath's review on The Land Before Time X: The Great Longneck Migration at www.reel.com Retrieved on June 7th, 2008. Bonnie Sayers on Bella Online.com said that Littlefoot finally meeting his father was a great surprise, but to see Littlefoot and his friends get acquainted with Bron and Shorty was nice. She liked that the films typically have more than one story occurring in them, but the stories always end up uniting at the end to solve the overall problem.Bonnie Sayers' review on The Land Before Time X: The Great Longneck Migration at www.bellaonline.com Retrieved on June 7th, 2008. Awards/Nominations The Land Before Time X: The Great Longneck Migration received two nominations for a DVDX Award in 2003. One was for Best Original Song in a DVD Premiere Movie (recepients were Olivia Newton-John (performer), Michele Brourman (writer), and Amanda McBroom (writer)), and the other was for Best Animated DVD Premiere Movie (recepient was Charles Grosvenor). Songs The music was scored by Michael Tavera. This was the first film in the series that did not use James Horner's original score. It was Michael Tavera's first and so far only completely original score in the series (older themes from the previous sequels to the original film and An American Tail were not used in this installment). The songs are written by Michele Brourman and Amanda McBroom. The end credit song, Best of Friends, is performed by Olivia Newton-John. A shorter version of the song Adventuring was heard in four episodes of The Land Before Time TV series. It features Chomper and Ruby singing as well, except that the third TV series version only features Ruby singing as well, since Ducky and Chomper are stuck on the high land with Thud in that episode. Also in another episode, the fourth TV series version of the song features Mr. Thicknose singing as well. In another episode, the fifth TV series version of the song features Shorty singing as well. This was the fifth time Spike sings; he can be heard humming at the end of Adventuring, even though Rob Paulsen was not credited for performing the song. The songs in The Great Longneck Migration consist of: *Adventuring *Me and My Dad *Bestest Friends (a.k.a Best of Friends) Trivia *This is the only film for Alec Medlock who voices Littlefoot. *Bron had been looking for Littlefoot ever since the Great Earthshake. *Mo makes a cameo in the Adventuring music number. *This was the only film in the series in which Alec Medlock provided Littlefoot's voice. In every film from this one onwards, there has always been a different voice of Littlefoot. However, Cody Arens voices Littlefoot in every episode of The Land Before Time TV series. *This was the only time Kiefer Sutherland (who was Ace Merrill in Stand by Me and also voiced Samson in The Wild) and Brandon DePaul voiced Bron and Shorty. Cam Clarke (the singing voice of Simba in The Lion King II: Simba's Pride) and Elizabeth Daily (a.k.a. E.G. Daily; the voices of Tommy Pickles on Rugrats and All Grown Up!, Buttercup on The PowerPuff Girls, Babe in Babe: Pig in the City, also released by Universal, Baby Mumble in Happy Feet, Froggy in The Little Rascals, also produced by Universal, and Lorenzo Odone in some shots of Lorenzo's Oil, also released by Universal) voiced Bron and Shorty in The Big Longneck Test episode of the TV series. *Rica Matsumoto, the Japanese voice of Cera, is also the Japanese voice of Ash Ketchum on Pokémon. *Pat's name is, like Bron's, likely derived from Apatosaurus. It is revealed in this film that Bron was called "Littlefoot" as a child. Therefore, Littlefoot's mother gave her son her husband's nickname as a real name. Bron's name is likely derived from "Brontosaurus" the now obsolete scientific name for his species Apatosaurus. *For years it was unknown whether Littlefoot's mother was his grandparents' daughter or daughter-in-law. With how Bron refers to Littlefoot's grandfather as "Papa Longneck" instead of "Father", its likely that Littlefoot's mother was his grandparents' daughter. *While both Littlefoot and his father, Bron, are saddened by his mother's death at the hands of Sharptooth, Littlefoot is more understanding of sharpteeth; this is probably due to his experience with Chomper. Bron, however, having had nothing to dissuade him from such feelings, hates carnivorous dinosaurs and calls them "cowards." *The title for the film had sparked rumors that we would see a return of Ali, the guest character from the fourth film (due to the fact she was part of a migrating herd). Many older fans were disappointed to see that this was not true. However, she did reappear in an episode of The Land Before Time TV series. *The original title for the film was simply: "The Great Migration", which caused a fair amount of speculationneeded, since this was the name of one of the tracks on the original film's soundtrack. *This was last time Littlefoot was an orphan; he finally found his father Bron in this film. *The film was the first film in the series to use fully computer-generated dinosaurs. *The first sharptooth to appear in the film has gray coloring. The next two were brown and green. *Even though this film was presented in full screen on DVD worldwide (because that's what aspect ratio the film was created in), the film is matted to widescreen (cropping the top and bottom of the image) on a Hebrew DVD in Israel.The Land Before Time - The Great Migration Por Various *This marks the first time any Land Before Time Character's teeth ever sparkled (Littlefoot) *When there are magic twinkles in and around Littlefoot's eye means he's dreaming. Character Debuts *Recurring characters: **Bron **Shorty *One-off characters **Pat **Sue *Species Debuts: **Sarcosuchus **Supersaurus **Argentinosaurus **Other Sauropods References External Links * [http://movies.nytimes.com/movie/290010/The-Land-Before-Time-The-Great-Longneck-Migration/trailers New york Times.com trailer for The Great Longneck Migration] * [http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0378230/ The Land Before Time X: The Great Longneck Migration] at the Internet Movie Database Category:Land Before Time Movies